Crispy Chicken Skin. It's What's for Breakfast.

Make no mistake. Bacon's not going anywhere. Its smoky, salty and fatty charms will always have a place in our heart and bellies. And we'll also always believe that most food is better with bacon.

But lately, we've noticed a non-porky ingredient, with a similar lip-smacking punch, popping up on some of our favorite chefs' menus across the country.

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We're talking chicken skin.

It crunches like bacon. It has the mouthfeel of bacon.

Like its porcine cousin, the possibilities are gloriously endless. Chef Ilan Hall, owner of the Brooklyn restaurant Esh and host of our own network's KnifeFight, swaps out bacon with gribenes–chicken skins fried in schmaltz, a hallmark of Jewish cooking–in one of his top selling sandwiches. Consider it a classy riff on a BLT, where you'll find tomato, lettuce, caraway rye, ramp aioli, and loads of, yes, crispy chicken skin.

But why chicken skin? Hall says though it was initially born out of necessity–"Jews have been using it for a while, and it gives you the sensation of bacon but is kosher"–he's partial to it for a far simpler reason. "You get a natural crunch and beautifully intense flavor. It encapsulates everything you love about chicken." (And really: who doesn't freak out over the skin first with chicken, whether it's roasted or fried?)

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And, like Hall noted: it crunches like bacon. It has the mouthfeel of bacon. While it's not cured or smoked, chicken skin packs a wallop of umami like bacon, making it equally addictive and totally worth checking out.

How to Make Crispy Chicken Skin

Where to Get It

Check out some of the ways chefs across the country are proving that everything tastes better with…chicken skin.

At Chris Cosentino's hot spot, one of the most talked-about starters is "Oeufs Mayonnaise." While the foundation is simple (hard-boiled eggs and house made mayo), the luxurious topping of seared foie gras and crispy chicken skin is anything but.

Solid yakitori joints abound in New York, but this one's possibly the city's finest. Here, the organic chicken skin (called "kawa") is threaded onto a wood skewer, grilled over prized Japanese binchotan charcoal with a watchful eye, and simply salted.

This globe-trotting dish is a delicious mishmash of Asian, Middle Eastern and American flavors. Who'd have thought that soy-marinated fried chicken skin, fresh and pickled watermelon, and baba ghanoush should play so well together?

Arguably the most satisfying way to eat bacon is solo, on its own, like a chip. That's the thinking at this Japanese-leaning spot, where chicken skin is baked to a shattering crisp, and brushed with mustard and honey for an irresistible sweet-and-salty flavor.

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